Bay Area ReporterMay 1, 2008Concerning the pending anti-marriage constitutional amendment in California, pollster Ben Tulchin said, "It's going be a tough campaign, but based on the polling we've done the folks who are against [the anti-marriage amendment] have a very good chance of defeating it in November [but] will need a well-funded campaign ... to tell voters why this thing is so bad." (Link)

New York TimesApril 20, 2008Torie Osborn writes about getting married to her former partner in San Francisco: “The astonishing outpouring of support from our straight friends taught me a profound lesson: getting married is a rite of passage into a wide circle of shared humanity. (Link)

New York TimesMarch 11, 2008The CA Supreme Court is the most influential state court in the nation, clearly making the outcome of the marriage equality case very important to the entire nation. At the marriage hearing, Chief Justice George quoted repeatedly from a 1948 decision of his court, Perez v. Sharp — the first state high court decision to strike down a law banning interracial marriage. Over the next two decades, the rest of the nation followed it, culminating in a similar ruling by the United States Supreme Court in 1967. (Link)

New America MediaMarch 8, 2008Former Berkeley City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque is sure the California Supreme Court will invalidate the marriage law's exclusion of same-sex couples from marriage as a violation of the California Constitution, and presents a lay person's guide to the gay marriage cases' legal terrain and the import of the justices' questions. [Link]

Los Angeles TimesMarch 8, 2008In a 3½-hour session that sounded sometimes like a law school seminar and sometimes like a radio talk show, the California Supreme Court this week wrestled with the question of whether the state Constitution's guarantee of "equal protection of the laws" requires the recognition of same-sex couples' marriages.... The best response came from the lawyer for the city of San Francisco, which briefly granted marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2004. "Words matter," Deputy City Atty. Therese Stewart said. "Names matter." [Link]